Dear Dr. Lepesqueur,

After thoroughly reading your manuscript and I concur with the generally positive attitude of both reviewers. In line with their assessment I think that the manuscript needs to be revised and that the study should be based on more solid grounds. I noted that the recommendation of reviewer II (accept after technical corrections) is inconsistent with the following central statement of her/his assessment “In my opinion this paper is worth publication for the improvements it describes to an already-validated and well-known modelling approach, even if this kind of contribution would have deserved a wider database of river contexts and stage conditions”. As this point should essentially be addressed in the new manuscript and I think this requires major revisions. Within those you should also shift the focus of the presentation to a stronger degree on the underlying physics, as recommended by reviewer I.

Best regards,

Erwin Zehe

Dear Dr. Lepesqueur,

I am pleased to let you know that both reviews are generally positive. While reviewer #1 recommended to publish the manuscript as it stands, reviewer #3 recommended clarification of two interesting points and that will surely improve its scientific quality. She/he also recommended to improve the general presentation quality of the manuscript and provided a long list of technical details for this.

I think these points can and should be addressed within a final round of revisions.

Best regards,

Erwin Zehe

Dear Dr. Lepesqueur,

I am delighted to let you know that your paper is now accepted for publication in HESS.

Kind regards,

Erwin Zehe